JENNIFER FOWLER            BIO                  (Updated 10/17)

JENNIFER FOWLER  was born in Bunbury, Western Australia, in 1939.  During her student years at the University of Western Australia she won several composition prizes and was awarded the University's Convocation Award for outstanding results.  While still a student, she had pieces performed in the Festival of Perth and broadcast by the ABC. In 1968 she spent a year working at the Electronic Music Studios of the University of Utrecht, on a Dutch Government scholarship.  Since 1969, she has been living in London where she works as a free-lance composer.

Prizes

1970 shared 1st prize from International Composers' Prize, Academy of the Arts, Berlin

1971 joint winner of the Radcliffe Award of Great Britain

1975 1^st prize in the International Competition for Women Composers in Mannheim, Germany

2001 high commendation in Paul Lowin Prize, Australia.

2003 the Miriam Gideon prize from the International Association of Women in Music

2006 2^nd prize in the Christopher Bodman Memorial Competition, UK

2009 the international Sylvia Glickman Memorial Prize

2009 equal winner of the Marin Goleminov First International Composition Contest in Bulgaria.

 

Works

Her output includes orchestral works, chamber pieces, works for voice and instrumental ensemble, solo music and vocal ensembles of various kinds.  She has written for top professional players and also for amateurs and children. 

Festivals

Her music has been included in such prestigious international festivals as the ISCM World Music Days; the Gaudeamus Music Week, Holland; the Huddersfield Festival of Contemporary Music, UK; the International Sydney Spring Festival; the Perth International Arts Festival, Australia; City of London Festival; and Women in Music festivals in London, Atlanta, Alaska, Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, Rome, and Beijing.

Commissions

She has had pieces commissioned by such organisations as the BBC; the ABC; the Festival of Perth; the Music Board of the Australia Council; the Radcliffe Award of Great Britain; the Seymour Group, Sydney; the Song Company, Sydney; Donne in Musica, Italy; Women in Music (UK); and the University of Western Australia.

Articles

Articles about Fowler can be found in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (Macmillan, 1980), and also in the latest edition of 2001; the Pandora Guide to Women Composers (Pandora, 1994); The New Grove Dictionary of Women Composers (Macmillan, 1994).  Articles by Fowler about her music can be found in: The Contemporary Music Review, Vol 11 (Harwood Academic Publishers, 1995); and Journal of the International Alliance of Women in Music, Vol 12, No 1 (Oceanna Music Publications, 2006).

Latest News

Plainsong for Strings has been chosen by European jury to be performed at a concert at a meeting of the European Composer and Songwiter Alliance in Vienna in October 2017. A commission from the University of Western Australia, for a piece for three cellos, Three Cellos, has been recorded and premiered. A new piece Magnificat 3 was premiered by Kaleidoscope Ensemble in Ipswich, UK . A commission from the Whitehall Orchestra, London for a concerto for alto saxophone, premiered in London with Amy Dickson as soloist. Other recent performances include: Uncoiling for oboe and piano, London, February 2012 and September 2012; Echoes from an Antique Land, (version for percussion ensemble), Brisbane May 2013; The Apple Tree, London, July 2015, and December 2015; Line Spun with Stars, London, January 2016; Hymn to Saint Brigid, Melbourne, March 2016; Threaded Stars 2, Melbourne July 2016; Letter from Haworth, Queensland, August 2016; Threaded Stars 2, Western Australia and Hong Kong